Fiat is planning to locally assemble the Abarth 500 at its Ranjangaon plant near Pune, India, which is expected to be launched in the country in 2014, reports PTI.
The facility has the capacity to produce 200,000 cars and 300,000 engines and transmissions on a yearly basis. The aim is to achieve a competitive pricing benefit, said Nagesh Basavanhalli, Fiat Group Automobiles India president and managing director. The 160 HP super hatchback is likely to compete with BMW’s Mini Cooper and Volkswagen’s Beetle in the luxury compact car segment in the market.
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“We plan to launch Abarth 500 later this year in India. Initially we would import the car as a completely built unit (CBU) but later on we plan to locally assemble it at our Ranjangaon plant,” said Basavanhalli.
In order to increase sales, the company plans to launch an updated version of its Linea in March and introduce four models till December 2014.
“By December this year, we will have a product line up of five vehicles. By 2016 we plan to have nine models in our Indian line up,” said Basavanhalli. “Apart from the Linea, we will also be launching new version of Punto, Avventura and Abarth 500 during this year.”
While the Linea Classic launched in 2013 would serve the low end of C-segment, the new Linea would cater to the high end of the segment. With the recovery of economic condition in India, the SUV Jeep would also be introduced in the country, he added.
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By GlobalData“Jeep needs to be in this (Indian) market. So when the market comes back it will be here. It will be come as a CBU, so we need to take into consideration other factor like the foreign exchange fluctuations before launching it,” said Basavanhalli.
“This will be a global launch of a vehicle designed and developed for the Indian market. We are targeting aspiring Indian and that’s why we are positioning it as CUV (compact urban vehicle),” added Basavanhalli about the compact SUV Avventura.
Additionally, the company is planning to export the Avventura from India and is presently analysing the potential markets for the export. The vehicle’s launch is scheduled in later 2014 with both petrol and diesel variants.
Fiat is attempting to re-create its base in India and is strengthening its sales network with the addition of new dealerships across the country.
“Our plan was to establish 100 point of sales across the country by March 2014. We are well ahead of the target. There are around 20 more in the pipeline. By December this year, we are aiming to have 150 dealerships across 80 cities,” said Basavanhalli.
